Thomas Lambert

Crowdfunding: Tapping the Right Crowd

Article history: Received 25 September 2012 Received in revised form 10 July 2013 Accepted 10 July 2013 Available online xxxx Field Editor: G. Cassar With crowdfunding, an entrepreneur raises external financing from a large audience (the “crowd”), in which each individual provides a very small amount, instead of soliciting a small group of sophisticated investors. This article compares two forms of crowdfunding: entrepreneurs solicit individuals either to pre-order the product or to advance a fixed amount of money in exchange for a share of future profits (or equity). In either case, we assume that “crowdfunders” enjoy “community benefits” that increase their utility. Using a unified model, we show that the entrepreneur prefers pre-ordering if the initial capital requirement is relatively small compared with market size and prefers profit sharing otherwise. Our conclusions have implications for managerial decisions in the early development stage of firms, when the entrepreneur needs to build a community of individuals with whom he or she must interact. We also offer extensions on the impact of quality uncertainty and information asymmetry.

Crowdfunding: Some Empirical Findings and Microeconomic Underpinnings

This article reviews some recent developments in the study of crowdfunding – i.e., the practice of raising funds through an open call on the Internet. It also shows how microeconomic theory can help us understand some important aspects of crowdfunding that go beyond the finance sphere of the firm. A special attention is devoted to the role and behavior of crowdfunding platforms, which intermediate between entrepreneurs and contributors. Throughout the article, the Belgian market for crowdfunding serves as the main source of illustrations.

Lobbying on Regulatory Enforcement Actions: Evidence from Banking

This paper analyzes the relationship between bank lobbying and supervisory decisions of regulators, and documents its moral hazard implications. Exploiting bank-level information on the universe of commercial and savings banks in the United States, I find that regulators are 44.7 percent less likely to initiate enforcement actions against lobbying banks. This result is robust across measures of lobbying, and accounts for endogeneity concerns by employing instrumental variables strategies. In addition, I show that lobbying banks are riskier and reliably underperform their non-lobbying peers. Overall, these results appear rather inconsistent with an information-based explanation of bank lobbying, but consistent with the theory of regulatory capture.

The Political Economy of Financial Systems: Evidence from Suffrage Reforms in the Last Two Centuries

Initially, voting rights were limited to wealthy elites providing political support for stock markets. The franchise expansion induces the median voter to provide political support for banking development as this new electorate has lower financial holdings and benefits less from the uncertainty and financial returns from stock markets. Our panel data evidence covering 1830-1999 shows that tighter restrictions on the voting franchise induce a greater stock market development, whereas a broader voting franchise is more conducive towards the banking sector, consistent with Perotti and von Thadden (2006). Our results are robust to controlling for other political determinants and endogeneity.

Endogenous Political Institutions and Financial Development

This chapter surveys the literature on the political economy of finance. This field offers three main insights. First, it highlights the importance of the role of political institutions in financial development. Second, it shows how the distribution of political power in society drives the prevailing set of contracting institutions and affects capital allocation and access to finance in developed and developing economies. Third, it argues that recognizing the endogenous nature of political institutions is crucial for our understanding of the evolution and functioning of financial systems.

The Crowd–Entrepreneur Relationship in Start-Up Financing

This chapter discusses the crowd–entrepreneur relationship as an important foundation for crowdfunding success. We present community benefits enjoyed by the crowd as crucial in shaping the entrepreneur’s choice between different business models (crowdfunding vs. crowdinvesting). Then, in the crowdinvesting context, we show that this crowd–entrepreneur relationship is plagued by persistent asymmetric information problems of hidden information and hidden action, which undermine financing decisions and campaign outcomes. We highlight how entrepreneurs can address these problems by taking sophisticated investors or a syndicate of investors on board.

Collective Bargaining and Mergers and Acquisitions Activity around the World

This paper studies the relationship between collective bargaining and mergers and acquisitions activity in 46 countries from the early 1990s. We find that the frequency and volume of mergers and acquisitions within industries increase in countries with powerful labor unions and high coverage of bargaining coordination. Economically, collective bargaining mitigates the negative effect of tighter employment protection legislations on mergers and acquisitions documented in prior works. Further analyses suggest that collective bargaining encourages mergers and acquisitions by reducing employment uncertainty among target firm employees. Our results provide new insights into the real effects of collective bargaining in the context of mergers and acquisitions around the world.

Collective Bargaining and Takeover Activity Around the World

This paper studies the relationship between collective bargaining and mergers and acquisitions activity in 46 countries from the early 1990s. We find that the frequency and volume of mergers and acquisitions within industries increase in countries with powerful labor unions and high coverage of bargaining coordination. Economically, collective bargaining mitigates the negative effect of tighter employment protection legislations on mergers and acquisitions documented in prior works. Further analyses suggest that collective bargaining encourages mergers and acquisitions by reducing employment uncertainty among target firm employees. Our results provide new insights into the real effects of collective bargaining in the context of mergers and acquisitions around the world.

An industrial organization framework to understand the strategies of crowdfunding platforms

This chapter shows how the theory of industrial organization can help us understand some important aspects of crowdfunding that go beyond the finance sphere of the firm. A special attention is devoted to the role and behavior of crowdfunding platforms, which intermediate between entrepreneurs and contributors.

Reforming Finance under Fragmented Governments

The last decades have been characterized by a global drive to reform finance, but the process has not been homogeneous across countries and over time. What can explain the observed differences in financial reform zeal? This paper investigates the role of government cohesiveness in explaining this heterogeneity, finding that fragmented governments breed stalemate. This phenomenon has often been assumed in the literature based on circumstantial observations, but a formal, systematic assessment was still lacking. We fill this gap by exploiting a panel dataset covering the OECD countries over 30 years and undertaking several robustness checks. Our results show that the number of parties and the presence of small, decisive coalition partners slow down financial reforms. This is consistent with theoretical models in which decision making requires cooperation among different agents with conflicting policy preferences.